Livestock farming has become bigger and more intense as well as fiercely competitive. Hog farming in particular requires the successful utilization of better breeding, optimum feeding and intensive marketing to be successful. Genetic engineering is continuing to create leaner and heavier hogs for market. The development of swine somatatropin has resulted in the potential for production of larger litters, more milk from the mother sows and healthier piglets which grow faster.
With the movement to larger producers, some now producing from 25,000 to 50,000 market hogs per year, controlled breeding, farrowing, feeding and finishing practices have become an economic necessity. Boars with good performance records and good breeding readings are an essential component of successful hog farming. As a general practice, pure bred boars are mated with cross bred sows and gilts to produce an offspring which can be fed to 240 pounds in 180 days. By utilizing computer record keeping and microprocessors to individualize feed and water per animal, the production of big and lean pigs for market can be optimized.
Swine appears to be the only mammal wherein artifical insemination is ineffective. Extensive testing of artificial insemination has resulted in low conception rates and litters consisting of one to two piglets. Thus, the selection and utilization of the best boars with the best producing sows and gilts becomes an imperative for swine farmers. Also, this practice is very labor intensive so every aid must be employed by the swine producer to maximize his effectiveness. Thus, it becomes important to be able to identify each sow or gilt mated with a particular boar in order to complete reliable records as a basis for selecting animals for future production. In fact, it is now possible for a computer to regulate through a microprocessor system the precise amount of feed and water for each particular animal per day by coding input into the microprocessor to trigger a mechanism to release the indicated amounts of feed and water when a particular animal enters a private stall.
For many years, metal and plastic ear tags have been used to identify particular animals such as pigs. Although used for many years, tags have never been completely satisfactory because they tend to become illegible with dirt, they are easily pulled off during rubbing or fighting, they are inaccessible when the pig is lying or standing in a particular position, they are impossible to read when the pig is moving and grouping is impossible. More recently, collars for animals such as pigs have been made from flexible webbing material such as nylon but such collars are not completely adequate either. Being made from web material, they tend to stretch and are easily rubbed off. Also, they can be chewed in two during fighting or the mating ritual. Tests have shown that it is very difficult to maintain flexible web collars for any extended period of time.